Hungary Expels 10 Russian Diplomats, Ending a 16-Year Run of Looking the Other Way

Hungary told 10 Russian diplomats Tuesday to pack up and leave. Foreign Minister Anita Orbán said the Russian ambassador was informed the group had "engaged in activities in Hungary that are unacceptable for diplomats under the Vienna Convention," according to The Associated Press. She didn't say what they did or give a deadline. She didn't need to.

Moscow knows exactly what this is. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told TASS the response "will be harsh and painful," and blamed the move on a "Russophobic lobby in Budapest," as reported by Euronews and the Times of India. Russian senator Konstantin Kosachev went further, framing the expulsion as proof Hungary is now falling in line with the EU and NATO, according to Crypto Briefing.

Orbán, who is not related to former Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, was careful to say this isn't a break in relations. "This decision protects Hungary's security and sovereignty," she wrote in a statement carried by ABC News and The Independent. "It does not imply breaking off diplomatic relations with Russia. Hungary intends to continue the necessary dialogue, based on mutual respect and adherence to the rules."

Sixteen years of a different policy

Hungary hadn't publicly expelled Russian diplomats since 2018, and sent none home even after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, according to the Times of India. This reflects a policy choice made by Viktor Orbán, who ran Hungary for 16 years as a close Putin ally, repeatedly blocked or delayed EU sanctions on Russia, and kept buying Russian oil and gas even as the rest of Europe cut ties.

Voters ended that arrangement in April. Peter Magyar and his center-right Tisza party won a landslide, giving Tisza a two-thirds majority in parliament, according to The Independent. Magyar campaigned on ending Hungary's pro-Russia tilt and rebuilding trust with the EU and NATO. Tuesday's expulsions are the clearest sign yet he means it.

What the diplomats allegedly did

None of the five sources say exactly what triggered the expulsions. But Euronews reported that Russian investigative outlet Agentstvo found at least 15 of the 47 staff at Russia's Budapest embassy have links to Russian intelligence, with six more suspected of similar ties. That's not an allegation from a Western government. It's from a Russian outlet, reporting on Russia's own embassy staff.

Euronews also flagged a 2022 case where Direkt36, a Hungarian investigative outlet, revealed that Russian intelligence services the FSB and GRU had hacked Hungary's foreign ministry IT system and had access to sensitive data for years. Viktor Orbán's government denied the breach at first, then admitted it two years later.

Foreign policy expert István Szentiványi told Euronews the expulsions are directly linked to espionage and mark a clear policy shift in Budapest. Hungary's current government hasn't confirmed to Euronews whether espionage was the specific trigger.

The fair question here

A reasonable skeptic could ask whether this is really about security, or whether it's a new government settling scores with the old one's friends. Magyar's Tisza party has made a point of promising to hold Fidesz and its allies accountable for alleged misconduct, as The Independent noted, so there's an obvious political incentive to look tough on Russia right out of the gate.

But the underlying facts hold weight regardless. Hungary's own foreign ministry was hacked by Russian intelligence for years. A Russian outlet itself flagged a third of the Budapest embassy staff as intelligence-linked. And Hungary was the one EU country that never expelled anyone after 2022, standing out from the rest of the bloc regardless of who ran Budapest.

What comes next

The European Commission's Christian Wigand called the move an expected reaction to what he described as "Russia's persistent campaign in using hybrid attacks against the EU and its member states," according to ABC News. That's Brussels' framing.

Russia hasn't said what its retaliation looks like. Historically, tit-for-tat diplomatic expulsions mean Moscow sends home a matching number of Hungarian diplomats from its own Budapest-equivalent posting in Russia. Whether Zakharova's "harsh and painful" threat means something beyond that, and whether it complicates Hungary's remaining energy ties with Moscow, is not yet answered. Watch for Russia's Foreign Ministry to name its specific response in the coming days.